Fox River Summit attendees Gary Swick of Friends of the Fox River, Cindy Skrukrud of FREP & Sierra Club, and Lenore Beyer-Clow of Openlands, chat after Gary received the “Doing It Right For The Fox” award for his work with the Fox River Monitoring Network. (Photo by Becky Hoag)

The Fox River Ecosystem Partnership (FREP) hosted its second Fox River Summit at Waubonsee Community College in Sugar Grove, Ill.  More than 100 people gathered to network and hear ideas about planning, best management practices, and ways to fund projects to help improve the health of the Fox River watershed.   The theme of the Summit was "Creating Lean and Green Communities" and the goal of this C2000 grant-funded event to engage more representatives from watershed municipalities was happily met.   Featured speakers included Roger Bannerman of Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, Doug Scott, Director of Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, and Marc Miller of Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn's office.   In addition, speakers from municipalities and local institutions addressed their peers with presentations on environmental stewardship, natural areas need management, creating a conservation community, and finding the green to go green.   A CD was distributed to participants that contained a wide range of resource materials.   Jeffrey Mengler of the Chicago Field Office served on the planning committee for this event and helped secure several of the key speakers for the program.